legionario? ” demanded
trying to see how close he could skim the
an artillery general, arriving with his glittering
ground without touching it, he almost drove
staff.
his backbone through his skull at the smashing
“Out of the way, up there!” shouted
impact. Four times he bounced, and each time
Aldridge, easing open the throttle in something seemed to break, each time he desperation lest he be ordered to dismount.
landed nearer the ground. But the motor still
“That Legion!” he heard an thrummed without a flicker. When he waddled exclamation, as the amphibian moved. A lopsidedly up to the hill, Sollano and Catozzi cheer was drowned in his ears as he shoved
were running to meet him.
the throttle open and careered wildly down the
“That duck’s got a broken leg!”
beach.
shrieked the Italian excitedly.
Far beyond the Spanish lines, with
“To hell with the leg!” retorted
tribesmen shooting at him and the gunboat’s
Aldridge. “What we need is wings. Turn her
shells geysering sand and smoke nearby, he
around, and get aboard. Look what’s coming!”
pulled resolutely on the stick. Over the desert
With sidelong glances at the landing
Frontier Stories
10
gear, they turned the machine and climbed
their hands describing circles in the air.
breathlessly in. A wave of yelling horsemen
Another backward glance revealed his
thundered toward them. Calmly Aldridge passengers doing the same thing.
opened the throttle, pressed the machine-gun
With the white-flecked waves dancing
trigger and charged straight into their midst.
under him, Aldridge cut his motor and nosed
A wing tip fouled one of the horsemen,
downward in a long glide.
and the amphibian ground looped. Dizzily
“Wheels!” he caught, in Sollano’s
Aldridge jammed on the gas, lumbered off in
frenzied accents.
the new direction and shoved the stick
Turning in his seat, Aldridge nodded
forward. Ahead of him was another wave of
with an assured grin toward the water. To the
howling riders, and bullets were screaming off
best of his understanding, the landing gear had
the metal cowling over the motor.
probably carried away at the impact with the
The nearest horsemen were almost charging horsemen. He wondered why all under the roaring propeller when Aldridge airplanes were not amphibians; certainly, if he pulled the stick back and felt the wheels leave
ever bought one, it would be nothing else. As
the ground. The next instant there was a it was—well, he knew no special technique rattling jolt, a dragging sensation below, and
about landing on water, but he could certainly
as he leaned back on the tugging stick the
never learn up there in the air!
Settling
rapidly
toward the sunlit bay,
of Morocco like a thing frightened out of its
he watched the unloading transport appear in
wits.
front of him, and lowered the tail of the
Hot dog! This was living!
amphibian with the intention of skimming into
He caught himself wishing the cadets
the trough of the shallow waves.
and instructors at Brooks Field could see him
Swiftly, while he unstrapped his safety
now, muddling through an experience for belt and noted that his terrified passengers which any one of them would have given his
were following his example, the transport and
back teeth. More than all, as he straightened
the crowded lighters whizzed nearer. Directly
toward the dancing Mediterranean with between the transport and the cruiser he laid victory screaming from his wings, he wished
his course, wondering vaguely why both ships
his hardrock father might see him now, and be
were hurriedly lowering lifeboats.
present at his triumphant landing.
Suddenly his head snapped backward,
A quick glance he stole toward his
almost breaking his craning neck, as the keel
passengers, and grinned at the scared look on
of the amphibian apparently snagged
the faces of the two desert hellions who something. The next instant a raging torrent of gripped the sides of the cockpit as if they were
heavy green water swirled over his head, a
afraid of soaring up to heaven in heavy hundred giant hands tried to tear him limb marching order, hobnails and all.
from limb, and something struck him a
Again, while he wondered at the resounding whack on the head.
strangely increased propeller torque, Sidi Dris
The world went out——
was streaming under him. Sollano and Catozzi
were yelling fit to burst their throats, and
FOR a long time he lay in a pleasant doze.
Aldridge looked back to see them pointing
Gradually came memory of the attack on
excitedly toward the ground.
Hassi Axdar, the forced march to Djebel
Down there all was confusion. Messaua, the triumphant flight in the Everybody seemed to be running around with
amphibian and the unexplained crash.
Wings in the Spanish Legion
11
He stared at a strange world, a world
out there, though, and entered a civilian flying
of the dim past.
school. But my father snapped the
To begin with, he was covered with a
pocketbook.”
spotless sheet. Narrow white walls hemmed
“And you snapped your fingers!”
him in. To his ears came the throb of engines,
the slap and swish of water. At sea!
“Father know where you are?”
Anxiously flexing his limbs, he was
“No, sir. And he doesn’t care a hell of
relieved to find that, barring a soreness in his
a lot.”
lungs and an aching head, he was apparently
“Oh, yes, he does.” disagreed the
intact. Weakly he climbed from the berth,
general, as the gray-bearded war
discovered that he was attired in pajamas, that
correspondent squeezed the bulb of his
his head was bandaged and that he was camera. “I’m a father, myself. I have a couple almightily hungry. On a determined hunt for
of fire-crackery sons, and I know. How about
breakfast and information, he opened the door
it, Mr. Royos? You’re going to give the boy a
and stepped out.
good write-up, aren’t you?”
Across the quarterdeck, off the
“You know I am, mi general. I saw
starboard beam, he stared at the familiar both his landings.”
brown heights of the Cape of Three Forks.
“Well,
legionario, how would you like
From the port beam slanted the pristine rays of
for Mr. Royos to send a copy of his paper
the morning sun.
containing the story to your father?”
Melilla
bound!
“All right, sir,” grinned
Aldridge.
“Hey,
legionario! ” called a voice, and
“What’s the address?” asked Royos,
Aldridge moved across the immaculate deck
producing pencil and notebook.
toward a group of beribboned officers and a
“Aldridge Mining Company, Salt
gray-bearded civilian seated on deck chairs. A
Spring, Nevada, U. S. A. My sister can read it
dapper young officer arose and shoved his
to him, I guess. She knows school Spanish,
chair behind Aldridge, who remained and he knows a little Mexican. What I can’t standing.
understand, though, is how I happened to
“Feel
like
taking
another flight?” crash yesterday.”
smiled the artillery general who had yelled at
“Your landing gear was broken,”
him on the beach at Sidi Dris.
chuckled the general reminiscently. “There
“Yes, sir,” grinned the American, was something tangled in it—a djellaba, if while a medical officer felt his pulse. “But I’d
nothing else—and the whole thing hung pretty
like to eat, first.”
low and fouled a wave. The machine turned a
“There goes your breakfast now,” twisting somersault. You were fished up rather pointed the general. “Take it into his unconscious, with possible internal injuries, so stateroom,, steward. Er—Mr. Royos, here, we brought you on to Melilla. Your wants to take your picture, legionario, for his passengers were unhurt, and rejoined their
paper. He’s a war correspondent. Any company at Sidi Dris.”
objections?”
“That’s what I want to do,” wailed
“No,
sir.”
Aldridge.
“Good! And now tell us where on
“He’ll be all right, sir,” said the
earth you learned to fly.”
medical officer, in answer to the general’s
“I half-learned, sir, with the United
questioning glance.
States Army, at Brooks Field, Texas. I washed
“All
right,
legianarlo, ” laughed the
Frontier Stories
12
general. “This ship goes back to Sidi Dris to-
paper: ‘Dear Dad: Does this sound like an
night with more troops, and you can remain
“adenoid aviator?” Jack.’ Be sure to put
aboard and report to your company ‘adenoid aviator’ in quotation marks.”
commander upon arrival. That satisfactory?”
There was a roar of laughter from the
“Thank you, sir,” said Aldridge, group of officers as Royos explained.
inching toward his stateroom as a warm odor
“Why the quotation marks,
of coffee, rolls and beefsteak emerged with
legionario? ” asked the general, his ample
the steward.
stomach shaking with mirth.
“By the way,” called Royos, producing
“They,” grinned the American, from
his notebook again. “Any message to go with
his stateroom door, “are to enclose the last two
the paper to your father? I speak and write
words the old boy spoke to me; his newest
English, and I’ll fix up a good letter in your
nickname for me, in fact. Say, Mr. Royos,
own words, if you’ll give me a few pointers.”
how’s to add a little postscript to that
“Get a big red lumber pencil,” directed
message? Something like—er—‘love to you
Aldridge sardonically, in English, “and write
and Sis!’”
in boxcar letters, across the whole page of the